


Because I Said So

by CinderScoria



Series: her name is jade [8]
Category: Zombies Run!
Genre: Gen, Like Whoa, SPOILERS for s3ep47
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-17
Updated: 2015-07-17
Packaged: 2018-04-09 17:43:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,703
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4358387
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CinderScoria/pseuds/CinderScoria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five's pretty pissed at Simon. Simon's pretty sure he knows why.</p><p>(He doesn't.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Because I Said So

The air is biting and cold. There’s a slight hint of ice threatening when one exhaled. And Simon had been exhaling a lot lately. Not that he didn’t before. Breathing is a thing needed to stay alive, after all. Or it used to be. Simon’s not sure if he could survive suffocation. Once upon a time, he would’ve tried, no question. No hesitation. Things are different now, and he doesn’t know exactly what has changed.

No, Simon’s been huffing and sighing and wringing his hands because he’s nervous. Possibly a little terrified. Because before Runner Five had crossed reluctantly back into the safe confines of Abel Township the day before, she had sharply turned and pointed at Simon. Flicked a thumb across her cheek and then touched it to the ring finger on her right hand. Waited until Simon nodded, understood, before leveling him with a glare that told him that if he didn’t show up, she’d hunt him down herself and feed what has been relatively healed back up to the zombs.

So here he is, at seven the next morning, happy he’d actually retained some of the rudimentary words Five had taught him when they first learned she could finally communicate using ASL. And nervous, of course, positively jelly-legged, because Runner Five has that sort of propensity, that capacity, to make it so. She’s a teenager, yes, a very threatening one… and, if Simon’s being honest with himself, one of the few ex-friends he’d left behind that he’d actually missed. They’d been funny together. He misses that, misses the way he could read her face—nowhere near the accuracy that Sam could, no, he’d never reach that level, but he’d been able to tell just by the way her eyes crinkled and her lips twitched that she’d thought one of his jokes was funny. Shouldn’t have made him feel so good. Did anyway.

And he hates that her not talking to him—well, not talking in the way she does—stung so deeply. And really, he expects nothing less from those he hurt back at Abel. But he knows Five has a streak of loyalty almost as fierce as her protective one, and he’d figured…

Well, it doesn’t matter what he’d figured. Five had shown she was less than impressed with his show of good faith when he’d more or less kidnapped her a few months back. And every time he’s shown up since, she had handed him nothing but a cold shoulder.

And it shouldn’t had bothered him, shouldn’t keep bothering him. And it does anyway.

So he’s standing there, and he’s waiting, and it’s cold, and Amelia told him half an hour before she was taking their Jeep and leaving him there in the dust (she wouldn’t, he knew, because she liked him and they had a weird sort of friendship that came out of only acting within one own’s self interest), and Simon’s ready to just say “fuck it” and throw in the towel. Then, lo and behold, Five comes around the corner, outside of Abel, curly hair unbraided and flying a little crazily from under her bandanna. She must have been going for a jog, even though it’s very literally the crack at dawn and Simon’s pretty sure Sam wouldn’t have let her run around on her own, even if the two sort of parted on a bad note—if you can count throwing him into the wall and damn near strangling him as a bad note. Simon frowns at the dark bruises beneath her eyes. The girl hardly ever sleeps. He knows for a fact she didn’t catch any hours the previous night. Too many nightmares. He knows; he’s been there.

“Sooo,” he says, rocking forward on his toes as she comes to an stop next to him. “Glad to see you’re up on your feet. Sane. More or less emotionally stable.”

She cuts a look towards him that is the clearest  _fuck off_  from her he’s ever received that he’s actually a little shocked the words weren’t spoken aloud. He blinks, tries to take back the conversation, fails a little bit. “Sam and you have your heart to heart yet?”

Violent, violent flinch. Whoops. Probably too soon then. Simon frowns some more as he surveys her and notices she isn’t wearing her Abel patch, nor her headset, nor her usual hatchet or her heavy backpack that may or may not be bottomless. He’s never seen Five outside without her gear on.

“He… does know you’re here right?” Small headshake. “Does Janine?” A short glare. Simon’s just incredulous. “You’re out here running alone? When Moonchild just lost you? When you’re barely recovered from that spectacular trip you had from that detox we gave you? Do you have a—”

He stops short before he can say ‘death wish,’ and she notices, giving him a tired smirk. Right. She’d told him once, more or less, about she’d been suicidal even before the apocalypse, that she was reckless because she didn’t care much for the alternative. He’d figured that by now, between the zombies and Abel and Sam that she’d have something to live for. To survive for. But either this latest setback was more like a restart, or that notion was incorrect from the get-go.

Simon frowns so hard he panics a little, thinking the lines would set in his face. But looking pretty doesn’t matter anymore. It doesn’t matter.

He inhales, and exhales, and the cold promises to freeze his tongue right off. Five’s looking amused, her cheeks flushed a little and the tips of her ears bright pink, browned only slightly by the color of her skin.

“So, ah… why exactly did you want to talk to me?”

Five takes a deep breath. And she points at him, and circles a closed fist on her chest, her eyebrows raising in a question.

And Simon doesn’t understand. “Am… am I sorry?”

Eyes crinkle. Twitch of the lips. She thinks this is hilarious. Simon has never felt so out of his depth. “Sorry for what? Sorry for snapping you out of that psycho hippie’s mojo?”

A “don’t be an idiot” look is leveled at him. Simon wasn’t sure he’d ever see it again.

He tries again. “Sorry for holding a gun on you and taking you to my lair?”

Nope, not that either. Simon furrows his brow because surely she can’t mean _that._  “Sorry for being a spy for Van Ark?”

There’s no real response on that one, just Five’s young face waiting patiently. Good Lord, she did mean that. Simon had figured he’d more than screeched it from the rooftops, how insanely, incredibly, irrevocably sorry he was. He’d fucked up a lot. A lot. And he’d damn near gotten everyone he called friend—everyone who’d called  _him_  friend—killed in the process. For a cure. For long life. For nothing.

And he knows—he _knows!_ —that there is not a damn thing on this earth that’ll let him make up for what he’s done, but that don’t mean he ain’t trying. He thought Five recognized that. Thought she’d already forgiven him. That even if he doesn’t have her trust and would never again have her trust that he at least has her forgiveness.

And he doesn’t.

Five’s still waiting, and it’s cold, and Simon suddenly doesn’t want to breathe anymore. “Am I sorry? What exactly implied that I wasn’t? I thought the whole trade-Abel-intel-for-miracle-immortality-drug, poison-the-water-supply, use-a-poor-kid-as-a-human-shield bit would make anyone sorry for the rest of their bloody lives! And hell, I’ve got longer to live than anyone, and you  _know_  that, and you’re asking if I’m  _sorry?”_

Simon’s livid, and Five just stands there with shoulders getting more and more tense while her face, usually so expressive as her only means of communication, it just stays slack and patient and a little mocking, like she’s daring him to say it, daring him to mean it.

So Simon does. “God, yes, you little—if I could take it all back I would. I would die in this godforsaken apocalypse of cancer or a zomb I didn’t see coming and I would be so  _happy_ , so grateful, to be dead I wouldn’t have the words to describe it all. Is that what you want, Five? Do you want to admit I’m selfish? I’m the most selfish person on the planet and I lied to all of your faces and I hurt people and yes,  _God_  yes, I am so fucking  _sorry!”_

He runs out of steam then, figuratively and literally as his words are expelled in puffs of white mist. Five stares at him, impassive, and then she nods once and turns to head back inside.

And Simon doesn’t understand. His mind is blank for a second as he tries to figure out just what the hell happened, and then he lunges forward and grabs her by the wrist. Five pivots, slides her hand right out from his fingers, and then slams an elbow into his throat. Simon drops like a rock, and Five’s on top of him, straddling him so her knees pin his arms down to the dust below. He’d forgotten she could move that fast. The shock actually drains his rage for a second and Simon slacks, lies still as he gazes up at Five.

She’s livid, too. And as he watches a myriad of emotions, accompanied with a few forceful signs, flicker in front of him. He doesn’t understand any of it. He’s not as good as Sam.

And she must have realized, must have seen in his eyes that she’d lost him, because she inhales and exhales and somehow when she does it it feels more alive. She moves off of him and gives him a hand up. She’s this small, stocky teenager, and she’s got scars too, but hers won’t go away. Simon’s missed this kid. He’s fucking missed her.

She rubs a hand down her face, like she’s trying to find the right words. Simon almost smiles. But he’s tired and he’s cold and he has six minutes before Amelia supposedly packs up and never comes back. And he really, really doesn’t understand.

“Why…” His voices breaks. He’s pretty sure it’s just the ice in the air. “Why did you do that?”

A shrug. She wanted to hear it.

“Yes, but why? I thought—”

She actually cuts him off with a look he can actually put words to.  _You thought I already knew?_

He just nods. She smiles, then, and it’s one of those smiles only reserved for Sam, or for Maxine, or for Janine or Eugene and Jack and others she’d more or less claimed as her own. It’s sort of sad, but it’s tinted with fondness and suddenly Simon realizes he was wrong earlier, that she absolutely has something to live for, and apparently he’s one of them.

The girl lifts her hands up and cups them to his neck. It’s not quite a hug. Sam gets hugs. But this is his, Simon figures. And it shouldn’t matter. And it does anyway.

She mouths the words, even though he thinks he can figure it out by now.  _I already knew._

Simon blinks, hard. “Then why…?”

She releases a hand to tap his chest.  _Needed you to know._

"Oh.” Simon’s not quite sure how to respond to that. Five can tell he still doesn’t understand, and even less than the fact that she’d known the whole time and still considered him hers and it really, really didn’t make any sense.

Five’s waiting to respond, and he’s standing there like an idiot, and his nose is getting numb. “I never said it.”

She shakes her head no. Her hands come up to circle the handshape “L” on either side of her mouth.

“That’s what I do,” Simon argues, not really meaning it, not really sure why he feels like he has to. “I crack jokes, I make people laugh—”

And he’s cut off again as she shoves a finger into his chest again, harder, eyes blazing.  _You laugh!_  And her hands are moving again, and he only catches the few signs he’d been taught, but he gets the gist of it.

“You’re upset because I laughed.”

She nods. They stand there, staring at each other, neither of them exhaling. Simon blinks. And he thinks he understands now.

“So… so all this time, you knew. You knew and you just wanted… me to show it?”

A small smile, the same smile, touches her lips. Simon’s a bit overwhelmed. It shouldn’t matter. It does anyway.

It suddenly clicks in Simon’s brain what brought this up. Yesterday, when he’d all but dragged Five around to get her home, coaxing her through the nightmares and hallucinations, trying to use himself as an anchor. How she’d cut him a look he couldn’t decipher when he’d insisted that he couldn’t possibly show up in a pleasant dream of hers. How, against his will, because he’d been terrified of her and for her, his voice had softened and, for once, he didn’t laugh.

Simon exhales. He has three minutes. He suddenly feels like he needs to sit down.

Five touches his hand and he refocuses on her face. She has her brows raised in a question. Simon just nods. He can communicate without words too. Even though, apparently, sometimes he has to use them anyway.

It’s right about that time the gates rise with their angry roaring and Sam of all people comes out, dressed in nothing but his nightclothes and hefting a bloody _shotgun._

“Of all the nerve,” he snarls, but Five rolls her eyes and turns to face him. There must have been something in her expression, because Sam says, “No, you don’t! You haven’t finished the tests, Five, and Moonchild could’ve been out there, and you’re talking to  _him_  of all people? How the hell did you even get out without me noticing?”

“Papa bear Sam to the rescue,” Simon says dryly. Sam actually levels the shotgun at him, though Simon’s pretty sure he won’t fire it. He’s immortal now, after all. Still, doesn’t mean Sam won’t just shoot him out of spite. Sam’s like that.

“And you could’ve been eaten alive by zombies!” Sam continues to rage. Five rolls her eyes again, and then taps her ear. Sam stops. Listens. His face eases a little. “Well that’s a bloody waste of a noisemaker, but all right.”

Simon can’t hear a damn thing. He feels incredibly out of the loop.

But he also feels better. Lighter. Less tense. He knows that has everything to do with this grouchy little girl who runs faster and harder than he does, and who has survived for so long even when she doesn’t really feel the need to, and who has all the protective instinct of a lioness and includes him in her pride.

And it shouldn’t matter. And it does anyway.

Sam and Five are still arguing, and Simon has two minutes, so he reaches out and pulls off Five’s bandanna, just like he used to. And just like she used to, Five reacts by turning on a heel and slapping him upside the head, snatching it back at the same time. And Simon laughs. He laughs and it actually feels like a laugh and  _God,_  he’s fucking screwed in the head and however long he actually lives is probably going to suck all around, but he has the forgiveness, the friendship, back from the one of the two people he needed it from the most. He can wait for Janine. He’ll wait forever if he has to.

“Well kids, it’s been a blast,” he says, lifting two fingers to his temple in a salute, “but Amelia gets real snippy if I’m late. And Five—” He catches her eyes, and there’s that smile again. He nods. “You’ll be fine.”

Sam is still glaring. Maybe it’s just the cold, but Simon’s pretty sure he sees his mouth fighting a smile too. Then he herds Five inside, and even though Five tenses when he lifts one of his bruised arms to her shoulders, Sam pulls her closer and she softens against him.

They’ll be fine. And now Simon will be too.

**Author's Note:**

> SO LIKE I forgave Simon a long time ago right, but his attitude just kept pissing me off and I couldn't figure out why until now. I just wanted him to admit he was wrong. To say he was sorry. Yeah. But I probs ship five/simon to the MOON and back and no one can stop me waaah


End file.
